A group from the Chisago Lakes Achievement Center , a day training center which works with developmentally disabled workers, raised $250 for disabled clients at the Union Gospel Mission in St. Paul, and presented the check on on January 22, 2013. (Pioneer Press: Scott Takushi)

Ashley of North Branch, center, spoke for a group from the Chisago Lakes Achievement Center , a day training center which works with developementally disabled workers, raised $250 for disabled clients at the Union Gospel Mission in St. Paul, and presented the check on on January 22, 2013. (Achievement center staff declined to share their clients last names because they are not their legal guardians.)

With temperatures falling well below zero, the Union Gospel Mission opened the chapel of its University Avenue men’s campus so men with nowhere else to go could spend the day there warming up from the cold.

From his wheelchair, Gerald Gowans, 47, was happy to see the storied St. Paul homeless shelter roll out “Mission Impossible” on a retractable screen. Gowans, who lost his left leg to diabetes five years ago, was just as happy for a visit from six young people from the Chisago Lakes Area Achievement Center, who came bearing gifts.

Alarmed by what shelter providers are calling a dramatic increase in homelessness in the Twin Cities, a group of developmentally delayed and physically challenged workers-in-training from the Chisago area pooled pennies, nickels, dimes and quarters — and even a few dollar bills — to help the homeless at one of the state’s oldest shelters and social service agencies.

Their penny drive has raised $250 since Thanksgiving, a small but symbolic gesture for the Union Gospel Mission, which is serving near-record numbers of homeless during one of the coldest stretches of the past four years.

“I’m Ashley,” said a 23-year-old client of the Chisago Lakes Area Achievement Center, addressing the chapel room of 30 or so homeless men. “We did do pennies, but some of us also brought in quarters, dollar bills. It was fun.” (Achievement center staff declined to share their clients’ last names because they are not their legal guardians.)

Cheri Du Charme, program manager with the achievement center, told the men of the Union Gospel Mission that their morning social skills and activity group — mostly composed of young people in their 20s training for jobs in retail and services — came up with the idea of a penny drive in late November.

“We started talking before Thanksgiving about what we’re thankful for, and it came from them,” she said. “They said, ‘Cheri, we have it nice. There’s other people that don’t have it so nice. Can we help?’ And they chose the Union Gospel Mission.”

The donation was a hit with the audience.

“That was a beautiful thing these kids did,” said Tony Mannino, 29, a former college student who said he has spent the past year homeless and has been living at the shelter for a few days.

Ken Peterson, who has directed the Union Gospel Mission for seven years, said the 111-year-old shelter serves 900 meals per day at three St. Paul locations — the men’s shelter at 435 E. University Ave., the Naomi Family Residence for homeless women and children at 109 E. Ninth St., and a child development center across the street from the Naomi residences.

More than 400 men, women and children spend the night in the mission’s shelter and transitional housing, which includes 32 emergency cots on the ground floor of the men’s shelter.

These days, those cots are all occupied. From October through December, Peterson said the shelter had to turn away 145 men because of capacity limits. But the recent cold spell has added a new dimension to their care-giving.

“When it’s this cold, we allow the homeless men to spend the day in the chapel,” Peterson said.

Using data from Wilder Research, the Minnesota Coalition for the Homeless reported a 25 percent increase in statewide homelessness from 2006 to 2009, when it counted 9,654 homeless adults and children.

“From 2009 to 2012, we know from counts at homeless shelters that it’s gone up since then,” said Kenza Hadj-Moussa, a spokeswoman with the coalition, which is based in St. Paul and represents 150 shelters and social service organizations statewide. Wilder Research will release a 2012 count by March, she said.

Gowans, who has been living at the men’s shelter for about six weeks, said he and other clients of the Union Gospel Mission would likely be out in the cold if it weren’t for the shelter’s services, which are funded by the general public. The faith-based charity receives no federal or state aid and is not financially supported by the United Way.

Ronald McBrian, 49, said he has been living at the shelter since shattering his ankle by slipping on ice on Christmas Day, and doctors have told him he may not be able to walk on his left leg for another year. McBrian, a fire suppression specialist, said his injury has kept him out of work.

“It’s a good thing they’re doing,” said McBrian, 49, after shaking hands with a disabled man named Justin in a wheelchair. “I was on top, and now I’m on bottom. You never know when you’re going to be on bottom.”

Frederick Melo was once sued by a reader for $2 million but kept on writing. He came to the Pioneer Press in 2005 and brings a testy East Coast attitude to St. Paul beat reporting. He spent nearly six years covering crime in the Dakota County courts before switching focus to the St. Paul mayor's office, city council, and all things neighborhood-related, from the city's churches to its parks and light rail. A resident of Hamline-Midway, he is married to a Frogtown woman. He Tweets with manic intensity at @FrederickMelo.

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